Aaron, Elisabeth, Brooke, & Molly Badenhop
We are working with Cru (Campus Crusade for Christ) for many reasons, but as big as any is that God used this ministry to change our lives. Our individual stories are similar in many ways. Though we both had experience in church with our families growing up, when we began to attend our respective universities, neither of us understood how Jesus was relevant to college life. So we both got into the party scene, making decisions that could have significantly impacted our futures in a negative way. But by God’s grace, He crossed both of our paths with other students involved with Cru who were authentically following Jesus, and we desired to experience what they had. Building relationships with these students and eventually being mentored by Cru staff, our passions changed and we individually felt led to serve Him by seeking to influence college students the way that our own lives had been changed.
“The universities, then, directly and indirectly, dominate the world; their influence is so pervasive and total that whatever problem afflicts them is bound to have far-reaching repercussions through-out the entire fabric of Western civilization. No task is more crucial and urgent today than to examine the state of the mind and spirit in the Western University.” - Charles Malik, former President U.N. General Assembly
We’ve both been working on staff now with Cru since 2004. Aaron earned a degree in history from The Ohio State University in 2003, while Elisabeth received her degree in education at Indiana University.
Aaron spent his first two years after college working as a staff intern with Cru in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Elisabeth spent her first two years after college working with Cru in Freiburg, Germany.
We met in 2007 at Ohio State, when Elisabeth first reported to join the Cru at OSU staff team, and were married in March of 2009. We believe that God crossed our paths and has brought us together as a team to influence men and women on campus for Christ.
